“It’s about Miss Beecher.”  Billy looked uncomfortable.  He hesitated, blushed boyishly through his tan, and blurted, “There’s something mighty queer about that departure of hers yesterday.”

“Ah!”

“I don’t feel right about it....  It’s deuced queer.  She isn’t in Alexandria.”

“Ah!”

“If you say ‘Ah’ again, I hope you choke,” said Billy violently to himself.  Aloud he continued, “I wired to the Khedivial and to all the other hotels—­there are just a few—­and she isn’t registered there, and the Maynards are not, either.”

“Possibly staying with friends,” said Falconer indifferently.  He regarded his paper.

“Very few Americans have friends in Alexandria.  However, that might be so.  But no ship has arrived from the Continent for three days, and it seems mighty odd, if they were there three days ago, for them to have wired at the last minute and had her tear off like that.”

“I do not pretend to account for your compatriots,” said the sandy-haired young man.

Billy looked at him a minute.  “There’s no use in your being disagreeable,” he remarked.  “I didn’t thrust myself upon you because I was attracted to you, at all.  But I thought you were a sensible, masculine human being who was interested in Miss Beecher’s whereabouts.”

“I beg your pardon,” said the other young man.  “I am—­I mean I am interested—­if you think there is anything really wrong.  But I do not see your point.”

“Well, now, see if you can see this.  I wired the consul there and some other fellow at the port, and they wired back that no people of the name of Maynard have arrived on any of the boats for the past two weeks—­that was as far back as they looked up.  Now that’s queer.”

“He could be mistaken—­or they could have bought some one else’s accommodations—­and that would account for the hastiness of their plans,” Falconer argued.

“But what train did she go on?”

“What train?  Why, the express for Alexandria.”

“That left at eight-thirty.  Now why in the world would she rush away in the middle of the afternoon, sending a telegram from the station and leaving her packing undone, for an eight-thirty train?”

“Why I—­I really can’t say.  She may have had errands——­”

“Where did she have her dinner?  Did she dine with friends at some of the hotels?  What friends has she here?”

“I really can’t say as to that, either.  I wasn’t aware that she had any.”

“And where did she send that telegram from?  There isn’t a copy of any such telegram at the offices I’ve been to—­at Cook’s or the station.  It might have been written on a telegraph blank and sent up by messenger with the money—­but why not come herself, with all that time on her hands?  And nobody remembers selling her any ticket to Alexandria—­and you know anybody would remember selling anything to a girl like that.”